Election Day '07

12:47 a.m. State GOP spokesman Mike Barley just tried to convince us that the glass may appear half empty, but it's really half-full. We're tired, he's tired and it's sure looking half-empty, but we just want to go to sleep.

"We really are surging toward next year," he said with what we're pretty sure was a straight face.

"Obviously a lot of people are judging the party on the outcome of the southeast courthouse races, and I think it shows the strength of our party as we're looking to next year to win the presidency," he said.

Holding the southeast is crucial to Republican hopes for statewide races, speaking of which....Barey says they're not ready to call the Lally-Green race for Supreme Court quite yet.

"It's a pretty positive night," he said. "I think the Democrats thought they were going to go five-for-five (in the judicial races) and then pick up the southeast courthouses."

At this point, Democrats look like a lock on the Supreme Court and Christine Donahue appears a likely winner for the Superior Court. Republicans Cheryl Allen and Jackie Shogan look like they have wrapped up the other two Superior Court vacancies with 94percent of precincts counted.

12:08 a.m. We just called over to the state GOP headquarters and were told their all upstairs crunching numbers. Hmm. Doesn't exactly sound good.

Besides appearing to win both state Supreme Court seats and at least one of the three seats on the Superior Court, Democratic county courthouse pick ups look likely in: Fayette, Clinton, Schuykill, Lawrence, Centre, Northumberland, Forest, Bradford and Somerset. They may also pick up a judge in Centre County and district attorney in Indiana County.

11:18 p.m. We've attempted to please editors by filing yet another take on the statewide judicial races and retention votes. But of course they're never happy. They expect us to do it all over again in an hour or so.

Nobody is conceding, but "if this trend continues, Democrats will wake-up happy tomorrow morning," says Mary Isenhour, executive director of the state Democratic Party. "I believe, based on our vote goals, we have the margins we need in critical counties to win."

Of course, she hedges by saying, "We will continue to watch it through the night."

Democrats continue to lead by wide margins in the state Supreme Court election to fill two vacancies. The Superior Court election, where there are three vacancies, has tightened with almost 70 percent of precincts reporting.

And we just noticed that Capitol Ideas finally caught up with the news of Democrats' scare video that we posted on Friday.

9:56 p.m. AP declares Mayor Luke Ravenstahl is re-elected in Pittsburgh. So much for all that optimism by Republicans. GOP challenger Mark DeSantis did mount the strongest run by a Republican in recent memory if not ever in the city, where Democrats have a wide registration advantage.

9:51 p.m. With less than 5 percent of the vote in, Republican District Attorney Bruce Castor is leading the Montgomery County commissioners' election with 26.84 %, former U.S. Rep. Joe Hoeffel has 25.17 %, Republican Commissioner Jim Matthews is at 24.57% and Democratic Commissioner Ruth Damsker is at 23.39%.

9:43 p.m. This waiting thing is getting. We filed a first editions story already.

Democrat Alvin Taylor is leading incumbent Dauphin County Commissioners Jeff Haste and Nick DiFrancesco 2,251 to 1,499 and 1,522, respectively. So basically it's real early. Hey, enjoy it while you can.

If you're in Nazareth, the Dems are planning a party tonight, according to Bernie at Lehigh Valley Ramblings.

While we were waiting to voter everyone began talking amongst themselves. One issue dominated the conversations. You guessed it. The issue was the judicial pay raise. Voters expressed to each how upset they were that Judges chose to accept the pay raise after the state Supreme Court decision made it illegal for state lawmakers.

Can't say we're honestly hearing the same across the state.

Our view of state Democrats has grown enormously as Mary Isenhour e-mailed to say, "Lieberman is the most thorough reporter covering the election tonight."

What can we say, we're a sucker for flattery.

7:15 p.m. Fourty-five minutes to go, or at least when polls close. Unfortunately it will be a lot longer before we get a real sense of tunrout or results.

"It is quiet, light to moderate," Mark Wolosik, director of the Allegheny County Elections Division, tells The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette of the turnout out west.

Across the state, Philadelphia Inquirer is reporting that rain and a sense of inevitability in the city's mayoral race were likely contributing to low turnout.

And in between, the Centre Daily Times reports it's pretty much what you'd expect in an off-year election. That would be a pretty low turnout.

While certainly not conceding anything, Taxpayers and Ratepayers United director Gene Stilp was declaring the election a moral victory if nothing else. Back home from driving his pink pig bus and standing in the cold outside polling sites, Stilp said reform groups have much to be proud of.

"The equation for retention votes will never be the same in Pennsylvania. We changed that," he said.

6:50 p.m. The company provided pizza has arrived, so all is good.

"Turnout seems to be very low," says GOP state committee spokesman Michael Barley. "We are still waiting to see how many people stop at the polls on their way home from work. Our Party is working hard to push any and all last minute Republican voters to the polls."

6:00 p.m. Democrats are feling good about early turnout numbers...as high as 40 percent by some estimates in Montgomery County, though far lower elsewhere across the state.

4:05 p.m. It's hard to argue that the outcome of the Philadelphia mayoral race is in question, but Dan didn't even bother waiting for the polls to close to crown Michael Nutter.

3:05 p.m. With just under five hours until polls close, turnout is apparently light, really light across the state including in places such as Pittsburgh, where Republicans think it could help challenger Mark DeSantis unseat boy Mayor Luke Ravenstahl.

Turnout is spotty. It's high or moderately high in some, but abysmal in others.

Midstate pollster Jimmy Lee of Susquehanna Research & Polling was on TV earlier predicting statewide turnout around 18 percent. That might actually be on the high side, but is in the ballpark of any of the guestimates.

Turnout was much higher in Northern Virginia, where we voted this morning before heading to Harrisburg. Several contested state Senate and state House races in Fairfax are toss ups and could determine which party controls the General Assembly there.

After voting in those races, we did our part to pervert the political process in some of the less glamorous contests. We were faced with the choice of picking three candidates for the soil conservation district board, yet the major parties couldnt even do that. Democrats' sample ballot recommended two candidates and Republicans only one.

We picked two and then wrote in the name of our son -- wish him Happy 6-1/2 birthday today -- for the third spot. Heck, he already knows a lot about getting dirty in the soil as well as about conservation. And we saw him campaign as much as any of the other candidates.

We'll update you on how he does.

7:01 a.m.

We never thought we'd get here, but it's finally election day.

The state Department of State has details on how to do it if you don't get it.

Because it's going to be a late night, we're going to post later in the day than usual and will live blog our way through the night with local and statewide updates.

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